Mission: Namibia! Comic Tips

4/8/2021

Mission: Namibia! Comic Tips

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Fun Suggestions for Building Literacy Skills!

Each week we'll share helpful hints on using the comic across the grade level span. I'll add each week's tips here so they are easy to find. If you are new to the comic, be sure to share the backstory of the characters with your students. You can watch the Backstory video on the comic page or read about it on the top of the comic page or click here to read the backstory and get a pdf version to share with parents!

If you need to share comic videos directly with students you can use these safe video links to do so:

Week 1

Pre K: Challenge your students use the pictures to tell this story! What are Curiosity Cat and Data Dog doing? What animals did they encounter? After students make predictions, read the comic to them. They can make sound effects along with you!

Kindergarten: Our new comic series has plenty of reading and word study opportunities for your budding readers! For our U.S. schools, you are nearing the end of the school year so your kinders have more skills now! They'll be able to decode not only sound effects but find many familiar words throughout the comic.
Challenge students to find /oo/ words. This week they'll find words with both /oo/ sounds (as in book and zoo). Brainstorm and sort other /oo/ words!

~ Written by Curtis Bentley ~ Illustrated by Ben Matsuya ~

First Grade: Young readers benefit from working on reading inflection. Reading with feeling increases comprehension and it's FUN! Equip your students with copies of the comic and have them highlight and color code ending punctuation (e.g., all periods yellow and all question marks orange). Then challenge them to read just a single sentence with feeling to a partner. Their partner should close their eyes and listen. At the end of the sentence the listener must try to identify the punctuation of the sentence they just heard!

Second Grade: Print the comic in little book form for this activity. We've included more challenging words in the text boxes this week. Have students mark the ones they find tricky, then write those on the back cover to create a mini glossary! They can add definitions after they consult with friends or other resources to determine the meaning.

Week 2

Pre K: Did you know even pre-readers can use details from text to support their claim? When you share this week's comic with them have them tell you what they think made the tracks leading under the couch. Then have them tell you why they think that! What evidence in the pictures supports their idea?

Kindergarten: This week's comic provides a great opportunity to do some word study focusing on vowels. List each sound effect on a card. (Pro Tip: Give this task to one of your early finishers prior to the activity!) Then sort the words by vowel sounds: short and oddballs!

short vowels; pop, zop, zup, gulp, pip, sniff, gag
oddballs: boing, arf
What's left? "Woof" where does your class think it belongs? Why? You can build on the vowel work last week! You can take this further and sort the short vowel words by sounds too. Sorting and classifying helps children internalize language patterns and helps them be better readers AND spellers!

First and Second Grades: As they year progresses, we've increased the reading challenges in the comic. Many of the tricky words will be familiar by the end of the mission but may seem a bit daunting now. Empower your readers by taking a moment to go on a big word hunt. Arm your eager word hunters with highlighters and set them loose! You call out a big word such as "herbivore" and challenge students to find it in the comic. You can narrow the hunt by working with a single frame or increase the challenge by expanding to a full row or even the whole comic. Continue with more words before reading the comic. By previewing some of the tricky words, your students can have more confidence as they read the latest episode!

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